The present invention relates to the field of multimedia communications, and more particularly a process and apparatus therefor for videoconferences that provides link-ups among several attendants and with extremely variable characteristics and modalities, adaptable to any specific need of the user.
Currently, multiple user videoconference apparati and techniques are known, and despite being based on different execution parameters, they make the choice of the image to be shown to the attendants on the grounds of the audio signal coming from the attendants themselves, which is technically called “audio presence”.
In other words, the sound received by the microphone located at every equipped location gets to the centralised videoconference management device. This device shows all the attendants the image of the user that has generated the sound impulse. In such a way, all the attendants receive the image of the person that is speaking at that precise moment of time on their screens. It is therefore clear that if two or more users speak at the same time, the conference management device carries out image commutations on a continuous basis, causing considerable disruptions and chaos all along the course of the videoconference itself.
Attention is also drawn to the fact that a user is allowed into a dialogue which has already started, even because of a background noise from his own environment, which could be completely independent from his will but is detected by the microphone located at his place.
Currently, in order to resolve such problems, it is necessary to turn off one's own microphone (but this risks turning an interesting debate into an endless monologue).
This type of automatic commutation caused by the audio presence, necessarily requires the presence of an interpreter next to each single attendant, in case of videoconferences that involve people speaking different languages.
Besides this, current technology does not always provide carrying out a link-up between different videocommunication systems. The apparati which are currently being used in fact only allow file transmission and/or sharing just in case the link-up devices of the several attendants are made by the same manufacturer, in so doing drastically limiting the possibilities of employment of the system itself (file sharing, transmission and transfer, etc.).
A further problem of the prior art is given by the fact that the possibility of executing fadings among the images of the speakers that make their contributions along the way, and possible audio-video contributions, whether they be films, photographs, static images, graphs and so on, is ruled out.
A further disadvantage of the currently viable videoconferences, is given by the fact that it is not possible to superimpose titles, subtitles, abbreviations, speakers' names, musical themes and soundtracks, and all audio and video effects that can make of a “flat” and static videoconference a real television programme.
In this respect, it is useful to observe that said problems and drawbacks have not only got purely aesthetic consequences, but they also cause a rapid decrease in the level of attention of the attendants, which is an extremely important factor for the success of a conference of whatever type.
It is also Known, from EP-A-0619679, a multi-location television conference system that connects five locations A, B, C, D, and E, when speeches take place at the four locations A, B, C, and D at the same time, at a listening location E, images of all the speaking locations A, B, C, and D are displayed on one screen with four divided screen areas. On the other hand, at the speaking location A, images of the speaking locations B, C, and D and an image of the former speaking location E are displayed on one screen with four divided screen areas. In addition, when images of speaking locations are displayed, locations names thereof are also displayed. Thus, a television conference held at a plurality of locations at a time can be smoothly managed as with a real conventional conference.
A first disadvantage of this conference system is that it does not allow the connection among systems having different transmission protocols, different type of signals or different technologies.
A second disadvantage of EP-A-0619679 is that said limitations prevent the simultaneous connection and use of quite different transmission channels such as satellite, computer network, telephone lines, internet, and so on.
A third disadvantage of EP-A-0619679, is that the information that can be displayed on the screen of each user, by superimposition with the images of the most recent speaker/s, are very limited and require the use and the creation of identification codes.
A fourth disadvantage of EP-A-0619679 is that it does not provide means for substitute the audio signal of one or more user with the audio signal coming from a simultaneous-translation room that translate, in real-time, the discourse of the speaker in that of the user.
Another disadvantage of the system disclosed in EP-A-0619679 is that the switching of the images displayed is submitted to the detection of an audio signal.